In the explanations that followed, no one showed a livelier interest than Peggy herself. She was in her element answering the questions which were showered upon her, and took an artistic pleasure in the success of her plot.

“You see,” she explained, “I knew you would all be talking about me, and wondering what I was like, just as I was thinking about you. As I was Arthur’s sister, I knew you would be sure to imagine me a mischievous tom-boy, so I came to the conclusion that the best way to shock you would be to be quite too awfully proper and well-behaved. I never enjoyed anything so much in my life as that first tea-time, when you all looked dumb with astonishment. I had made up my mind to go on for a week, but mother is coming to-morrow, and I couldn’t keep it up before her, so I was obliged to explode to-night. Besides, I’m really quite fatigued with being good—”

“And are you—are you—really not proper, after all?” gasped Mellicent blankly; whereat Peggy clasped her hands in emphatic protest.

“Proper! Oh, my dear, I am the most awful person. I am always getting into trouble. You know what Arthur was? Well, I tell you truly, he is nothing to me. It’s an extraordinary thing. I have excellent intentions, but I seem bound to get into scrapes. There was a teacher at Brighton, Miss Baker,—a dear old thing. I called her ‘Buns.’—She vowed and declared that I shortened her life by bringing on palpitation of the heart. I set the dressing-table on fire by spilling matches and crunching them beneath my heels. It was not a proper dressing-table, you know—just a wooden thing frilled round with muslin. We had two blazes in the last term. And a dreadful thing occurred! Would you believe that I was actually careless enough to sit down on the top of her best Sunday hat, and squash it as flat as a pancake!”

Despite her protestations of remorse, Peggy’s voice had an exultant ring as she detailed the history of her escapades, and Esther shrewdly suspected that she was by no means so penitent as she declared. She put on her most severe expression, and said sternly—

“You must be dreadfully careless. It is to be hoped you will be more careful here, for your room is far-away from ours, and you might be burned to death before anyone discovered you. Mother never allows anyone to read in bed in this house, and she is most particular about matches. You wouldn’t like to be burned to a cinder all by yourself some fine night, I should say?”

“No, I shouldn’t—or on a wet one either. It would be so lonely,” said Peggy calmly. “No; I am a reformed character about matches. I support home industries, and go in for safeties, which ‘strike only on the box.’ But the boys would rescue me.” She turned with a smile, and beamed upon the three tall lads. “Wouldn’t you, boys? If you hear me squealing any night, don’t stop to think. Just catch up your ewers of water, and rush to my bedroom. We might get up an amateur fire-brigade, to be in readiness. You three would be the brigade, and I would be the captain and train you. It would be capital fun. At any moment I could give the signal, and then, whatever you were doing—playing,—working,—eating,—or on cold frosty nights, just when you were going to bed, off you would have to rush, and get out your fire-buckets. Sometimes you might have to break the ice, but there’s nothing like being prepared. We might have the first rehearsal to-night—”

“It’s rather funny to hear you talking of being captain over the boys, because the day we heard that you were coming, they all said that if they were to be bothered with a third girl in the house, you would have to make yourself useful, and that you should be their fag. Max said so, and so did Oswald, and then Robert said they shouldn’t have you. He had lots of little odd things he wanted done, and he could make you very useful. He said the other boys shouldn’t have you; you were his property.”

“Tut, tut!” said Peggy pleasantly. She looked at the three scowling, embarrassed faces, and the mocking light danced back into her eyes. “So they were all anxious to have me, were they? How nice! I’m gratified to hear it. Is there any little thing I can do for your honourable self now, Mr Darcy, before I dress for dinner?”

Robert looked across the room at Mellicent with an expression which made that young person tremble in her shoes.

“All right, young lady, I’ll remember you!” he said quietly. “I’ve warned you before about repeating conversations. Now you’ll see what happens. I’ll cure you of that little habit, my dear, as sure as my name is Robert Darcy—”

“The Honourable Robert Darcy!” murmured a silvery voice from the other side of the fireplace. Robert turned his head sharply, but Peggy was gazing into the coals with an air of lamb-like innocence, and he subsided into himself with a grunt of displeasure.

The next day Mrs Saville came to lunch, and spent the afternoon at the vicarage. As Maxwell had said, she was a beautiful woman; tall, fair, and elegant, and looking a very fashionable lady when contrasted with Mrs Asplin in her well-worn serge, but her face was sad and anxious in expression. Esther noticed that her eyes filled with tears more than once as she looked round the table at the husband and wife and the three tall, well-grown children; and when the two ladies were alone in the drawing-room she broke into helpless sobbings.

“Oh, how happy you are! How I envy you! Husband, children,—all beside you. Oh, never, never let one of your girls marry a man who lives abroad. My heart is torn in two; I have no rest. I am always longing for the one who is not there. I must go back,—the major needs me; but my Peggy,—my own little girl! It is like death to leave her behind!”

Mrs Asplin put her arms round the tall figure, and rocked her gently to and fro.

“I know! I know!” she said brokenly. “I ache for you, dear; but I understand! I have parted with a child of my own—not for a few years, but for ever, till we meet again in God’s heaven. I’ll help you every way I can. I’ll watch her night and day; I’ll coddle her when she’s ill; I’ll try to make her a good woman. I’ll love her, dear, and she shall be my own special charge. I’ll be a second mother to her.”

“You dear, good woman! God bless your kind heart!” said Mrs Saville brokenly. “I can’t help breaking down, but indeed I have much to be thankful for. I can’t tell you what a relief it is to feel that she is in this house. The principals of that school at Brighton were all that is good and excellent, but they did not understand my Peggy.” The tears were still in her eyes, but she broke into a flickering smile at the last word. “My children have such spirits! I am afraid they really do give more trouble than other boys and girls, but they are not really naughty. They are truthful and generous, and wonderfully warm-hearted. I never needed to punish Peg when she was a little girl; it was enough to show that she had grieved me. She never did the same thing again after that; but—oh, dear me!—the ingenuity of that child in finding fresh fields for mischief! Dear Mrs Asplin, I am afraid she will try your patience. You must be sure to keep a list of all the breakages and accidents, and charge them to our account. Peggy is an expensive little person. You know what Arthur was.”

“Bless him—yes! I had hardly a tumbler left in the house,” said Mrs Asplin, with gusto. “But I don’t grieve myself about a few breakages. I have had too much to do with schoolboys for that!—And now give me all the directions you can about this precious little maid, while we have the room to ourselves.”

For the next hour there the two ladies sat in conclave about Miss Peggy’s mental, moral, and physical welfare. Mrs Asplin had a book in her hand, in which from time to time she jotted down notes of a curious and inconsequent character. “Pay attention to private reading. Gas-fire in her bedroom for chilly weather. See dentist in Christmas holidays. Query: gold plate over eye-tooth? Boots to order, Beavan and Company, Oxford Street. Cod-liver oil in winter. Careless about changing shoes. Damp brings on throat. Aconite and belladonna.” So on, and so on. There seemed no end to the warnings and instructions of this anxious mother; but when all was settled as far as possible, the ladies adjourned into the schoolroom to join the young people at their tea, so that Mrs Saville might be able to picture her daughter’s surroundings when separated from her by those weary thousands of miles.

“What a bright, cheery room!” she said smilingly, as she took her seat at the table, and her eyes wandered round as if striving to print the scene in her memory. How many times, as she lay panting beneath the swing of the punkah, she would recall that cool English room, with its vista of garden through the windows, the long table in the centre, the little figure with the pale face and plaited hair, seated midway between the top and bottom! Oh! the moments of longing—of wild, unbearable longing—when she would feel that she must break loose from her prison-house and fly away,—that not the length of the earth itself could keep her back, that she would be willing to give up life itself just to hold Peggy in her arms for five minutes, to kiss the sweet lips, to meet the glance of the loving eyes—

But this would never do! Had she not vowed to be cheerful? The young folks were looking at her with troubled glances. She roused herself, and said briskly—

“I see you make this a playroom as well as a study. Somebody has been wood-carving over there, and you have one of those dwarf billiard-tables. I want to give a present to this room—something that will be a pleasure and occupation to you all; but I can’t make up my mind what would be best. Can you give me a few suggestions? Is there anything that you need, or that you have fancied you might like?”

“It’s very kind of you,” said Esther warmly; and echoes of “Very kind!” came from every side of the table, while boys and girls stared at each other in puzzled consideration. Maxwell longed to suggest a joiner’s bench, but refrained out of consideration for the girls’ feelings. Mellicent’s eager face, however, was too eloquent to escape attention, and Mrs Saville smiled at her in an encouraging manner.

“Well, dear, what is it? Don’t be afraid. I mean something really nice and handsome; not just a little thing. Tell me what you thought?”

“A—a new violin!” cried Mellicent eagerly. “Mine is so old and squeaky, and my teacher said I needed a new one badly. A new violin would be nicest of all.”

Mrs Saville looked round the table, caught an expressive grimace going the round of three boyish faces, and raised her eyebrows inquiringly.

“Yes? Whatever you like best, of course. It is all the same to me. But would the violin be a pleasure to all? What about the boys?”

“They would hear me play! The pieces would sound nicer. They would like to hear them.”

“Ahem!” coughed Maxwell loudly; and at that there was a universal shriek of merriment. Peggy’s clear “Ho! ho!” rang out above the rest, and her mother looked at her with sparkling eyes. Yes, yes, yes; the child was happy! She had settled down already into the cheery, wholesome life of the vicarage, and was in her element among these merry boys and girls! She hugged the thought to her heart, finding in it her truest comfort. The laughter lasted several minutes, and broke out intermittently from time to time as that eloquent cough recurred to memory, but after all it was Mellicent who was the one to give the best suggestion.

“Well then, a—a what-do-you-call-it!” she cried. “A thing-um-me-bob! One of those three-legged things for taking photographs! The boys look so silly sometimes, rolling about together in the garden, and we have often and often said, ‘Don’t you wish we could take their photographs? They would look such frights!’ We could have ever so much fun with a what-do-you-call-it?”

“Ah, that’s something like!” “Good business.” “Oh, wouldn’t it be sweet!” came the quick exclamations; and Mrs Saville looked most pleased and excited of all.

“A camera!” she cried. “What a charming idea! Then you would be able to take photographs of Peggy and the whole household, and send them out for me to see. How delightful! That is a happy thought, Mellicent. I am so grateful to you for thinking of it, dear. I’ll buy a really good large one, and all the necessary materials, and send them down at once. Do any of you know how to set to work?”

“I do, Mrs Saville,” Oswald said. “I had a small camera of my own, but it got smashed some years ago. I can show them how to begin, and we will take lots of photographs of Peggy for you, in groups and by herself. They mayn’t be very good at first, but you will be interested to see her in different positions. We will take her walking, and bicycling, and sitting in the garden, and every way we can think of—”

“And whenever she has a new dress or hat, so that you may know what they are like,” added Mellicent anxiously. “Are her hats going to be the same as ours, or is she to choose them for herself?”

“She may choose them for herself, subject, of course, to your mother’s refraining influence. If she were to develop a fondness for scarlet feathers, for instance, I think Mrs Asplin should interfere; but Peggy has good taste. I don’t think she will go far wrong,” said the girl’s mother, looking at her fondly; and the little white face quivered before it broke into its sunny, answering smile.

Three times that evening, after Mrs Saville had left, did her companions surprise the glitter of tears in Peggy’s eyes; but there was a dignified reserve about her manner which forbade outspoken sympathy. Even when she was discovered to be quietly crying behind her book, when Maxwell flipped it mischievously out of her hands,—even then did Peggy preserve her wonderful self-possession. The tears were trickling down her cheeks, and her poor little nose was red and swollen, but she looked up at Maxwell without a quiver, and it was he who stood gaping before her, aghast and miserable.

“Oh, I say! I’m fearfully sorry!”

“So am I,” said Peggy severely. “It was rude, and not at all funny. And it injures the book. I have always been taught to reverence books, and treat them as dear and valued companions. Pick it up, please. Thank you. Don’t do it again.” She hitched herself round in her chair, and settled down once more to her reading, while Maxwell slunk back to his seat. When Peggy was offended she invariably fell back upon Mariquita’s grandiose manner, and the sting of her sharp little tongue left her victims dumb and smarting.